Category: Happy Friday

While this week was difficult, there were little moments of joy sprinkled throughout. I realized that our wedding is no longer a vague ways away, but in a few weeks. Despite the stress dreams, I’ve been enjoying the last few bits of planning. Instead of rings, we’ve decided to exchange framed hand-written vows. My mom and I went shopping for accessories. Tomorrow I’m going for a bra fitting. Oh la la!

I’m a natural worrier. I worry about the weather, the violinist who hasn’t emailed me back, and if I’ll like the flowers. The one thing I haven’t worried about is the man I’m marrying. I think that’s the important part.

Reading

I’m loving An Unkindness of Ghosts despite having limited reading time. The world building is exquisite and Aster is unlike any other protagonist. Sadly I won’t be getting much extra time to read soon.

Online, I enjoyed Wired’s article about Microsoft’s parental leave requirement for subcontractors. When I had my son, I had to go back to work after about 8 weeks. It was hard enough for me, someone with the luxury of a job sitting at a desk to go back when I did. It’s even harder for people who work on their feet. This line in the article stuck out: “paid family leave was the most desired workplace benefit.” Shout it from the rooftops, people!

One of the hardest things about being a mother is the judgement. We live in a society where nearly every parenting action, particularly of mothers, is scrutinized by others. Kelly in the City’s thoughts on the subject closely mirror my own. I’m so grateful for the judgement-free online community parents I’ve found.

Playing

Battle for Azeroth has been the perfect stress relief this week, particularly getting absorbed in the Nazmir quest chain. I think the fiancé may want to play our Alliance mains with me again soon, but he’s been leveling a shaman.

Tonight we played some Pokemon Go and walked to a small event downtown. The ice cream sandwiches were delicious. I always forget about Pokemon Go as a game I play, as it’s just become a regular part of life. My interest in it has been waning lately. We need some new Pokemon to catch.

Writing

Today marks the end of Blaugust. I’m glad I participated. It was the catalyst for me to launch the blog and a way to connect me to a larger blogging community. However, I have felt pressured to post more, perhaps lower quality posts than I would like. Yesterday I was working on a post and trying to get it finished. Eventually I decided I really wanted to spend more time and thought on the topic and posted some photos of my cat instead. I don’t mind posting (literal, in my cat’s case) fluff and I love injecting some humor in my writing, but some of the topics I want to tackle require more thought. Those posts are going to take longer than a half hour at lunchtime or 45 minutes in the evening to explore.

At the same time I tend to try to be too perfectionist in my writing and sometimes I need to just let go and hit publish. Perhaps the scales need some time to find the right balance.

Doing

That said: I’ve decided to go on hiatus until around the end of October. I have so many things coming up including my wedding, my honeymoon, a work trip, my son starting a new daycare, and some personal things. If I have extra time, I may spend it working on some of the more in-depth pieces I have brewing in my head so I can finish them when I start back up again.

I’m not sure I’d want to watch concept art videos on a huge outdoor screen. Or maybe I would? Either way, when my son’s older I love the idea of outdoor movie night. Here’s how to make your own screen.

Cover image from Crowfall, which might turn out to be the prettiest MMO ever.

It’s Friday! Here’s the list of lucious links for the week, starting off with this recipe for Greek Shrimp Saganaki. My coworker posted it in our cooking slack channel and it’s all my mouth can think about.

I’m still obsessed with Civ 6 and excited to hear about upcoming Tropico 6. I used to play the original, but then never tried any of the sequels. Is it time? It doesn’t look like it will be out for a while so I may be done with my Civ 6 playing by then.

This is going to be a short one. It has been a week. My son’s daycare is closing, meaning most of my free time has been spent scrambling to find a new one. Work’s been extra busy for both me and my fiancé, and all I want to do is play Civ 6.

The Best Ted Talks for Moms Parents – I updated the title, because why just moms? I like TED talks because they’re short little bursts of information. You don’t need 40 minutes to set aside to watch. You don’t even need to watch; I often just listen. Perfect for moms parents.

It’s Friday, which means it’s almost the weekend! It also means here’s a little list of yummy links to gobble up.

How to stream Making It – You know you want to watch Making It, the crafting competition with Amy Poehler and Nick Offerman. If you’re like me and never watch TV when it actually airs, you’re in luck! There are lots of streaming options.

ZigZag is my new favorite podcast! Two women are taking on journalism by starting their own company and this is their journey. And they’re both moms! The host, Manoush Zomorodi is one of my personal heroes.

A Leisurely Pace is a fantastic little piece about choosing not to make “meaningful progress” in a video game. Because that feels like work. I don’t want playing games to feel like work. That’s the whole point!

Braxwolf discusses playing video games when your kids get older. How do you find time when they go to bed later and there’s only so much overlap in your interests? That is one good thing about having a two year old: early bed times and long naps.

If I’ve learned one thing this week it’s that people are upset over Blizzard’s narrative direction leading up to the new expansion. The MMO Syndicate has one of my favorite theories: the possibility of switching sides. Unlikely, but I’m imagining a long and epic quest chain involved. Fun idea, right?

This Wired piece about writing a short story following rules generated by a bot is from December, but it’s new to me. The rules the bot came up with were fascinating, particularly how much dialog women could have. The story suffered from all the required adverbs. I try to avoid adverbs in my writing. The article includes an annotated version of the actual story. Despite the excessive adverbs, it has an interesting concept: what if we discover life on another planet, but all we can do is watch them from a distance?